This book recounts a series of discussions between philosopher Jorge J. E. Gracia and fifteen prominent scholars on race, ethnicity, nationality, and Hispanic/Latino identity in the United States. ...
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This book recounts a series of discussions between philosopher Jorge J. E. Gracia and fifteen prominent scholars on race, ethnicity, nationality, and Hispanic/Latino identity in the United States. These debates relate to two distinct traditions: the philosophy of race begun by African Americans in the nineteenth century, and the search for an understanding of identity initiated by Latin American philosophers in the sixteenth century. Participants include Linda M. Alcoff, K. Anthony Appiah, Richard J. Bernstein, Lawrence Blum, Robert Gooding-Williams, Eduardo Mendieta, and Lucius T. Outlaw Jr. The resulting dialogues reflect the analytic, Aristotelian, Continental, literary, Marxist, and pragmatic schools of thought. The debates cover the philosophy of Hispanics/Latinos in the United States and then move on to the philosophy of African Americans and Anglo Americans in the United States and the philosophy of Latin Americans in Latin America. Gracia and his interlocutors discuss the nature of race and ethnicity and their relation to nationality, linguistic rights, matters of identity, and affirmative action. They bind the concepts of race and ethnicity together in ways that open up new paths of inquiry. Gracia's familial-historical theory of ethnic and Hispanic/Latino identity operates at the center of each of these discussions, providing access to the philosopher's arguments while adding depth to issues that can be difficult to understand.Less

Published in print: 2015-06-30

This book recounts a series of discussions between philosopher Jorge J. E. Gracia and fifteen prominent scholars on race, ethnicity, nationality, and Hispanic/Latino identity in the United States. These debates relate to two distinct traditions: the philosophy of race begun by African Americans in the nineteenth century, and the search for an understanding of identity initiated by Latin American philosophers in the sixteenth century. Participants include Linda M. Alcoff, K. Anthony Appiah, Richard J. Bernstein, Lawrence Blum, Robert Gooding-Williams, Eduardo Mendieta, and Lucius T. Outlaw Jr. The resulting dialogues reflect the analytic, Aristotelian, Continental, literary, Marxist, and pragmatic schools of thought. The debates cover the philosophy of Hispanics/Latinos in the United States and then move on to the philosophy of African Americans and Anglo Americans in the United States and the philosophy of Latin Americans in Latin America. Gracia and his interlocutors discuss the nature of race and ethnicity and their relation to nationality, linguistic rights, matters of identity, and affirmative action. They bind the concepts of race and ethnicity together in ways that open up new paths of inquiry. Gracia's familial-historical theory of ethnic and Hispanic/Latino identity operates at the center of each of these discussions, providing access to the philosopher's arguments while adding depth to issues that can be difficult to understand.

This chapter begins with a retrospective look by Charles Mills at the development of Africana and critical race philosophy over the last thirty years, both the progress made by the fields and their ...
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This chapter begins with a retrospective look by Charles Mills at the development of Africana and critical race philosophy over the last thirty years, both the progress made by the fields and their continuing marginalization in the discipline. The chapter uses the fate of Mills’s book, The Racial Contract, as illustrative. On the one hand, it is an academic bestseller; on the other hand, it has had next to no impact on the debate within mainstream white contractarian and Rawlsian political philosophy. The chapter ends with some speculations about why the “whiteness” of philosophy, including political philosophy, is more extreme and recalcitrant than in other academic disciplines.Less

The Whiteness of Political Philosophy

Charles W. Mills

Published in print: 2017-05-25

This chapter begins with a retrospective look by Charles Mills at the development of Africana and critical race philosophy over the last thirty years, both the progress made by the fields and their continuing marginalization in the discipline. The chapter uses the fate of Mills’s book, The Racial Contract, as illustrative. On the one hand, it is an academic bestseller; on the other hand, it has had next to no impact on the debate within mainstream white contractarian and Rawlsian political philosophy. The chapter ends with some speculations about why the “whiteness” of philosophy, including political philosophy, is more extreme and recalcitrant than in other academic disciplines.

This chapter examines Frantz Fanon’s existential phenomenological analysis of racism as a system. In 1952, Fanon’s Black Skin, White Masks, which became the defining text of what today is called the ...
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This chapter examines Frantz Fanon’s existential phenomenological analysis of racism as a system. In 1952, Fanon’s Black Skin, White Masks, which became the defining text of what today is called the critical philosophy of race. Black Skin, White Masks is an original work of philosophy in its own right that moves beyond the responses to racism provided by the previous generation of black authors, which included Aimé Césaire and Léopold Sédar Senghor. The chapter explores what moves Fanon’s existentialism from the realm of personal testimony to a philosophy with strong political implications, as well as his engagement with the work of Jean-Paul Sartre. It also traces the evolution of Fanon’s writing on race with his first published work, “The Lived Experience of the Black,” together with his effort to formulate a response to the impasses of his earlier position and to racism more generally. Fanon’s seminal insight was to see racism interweaved with its institutionalized forms in colonialism, which meant that racism could be overcome only through a violent revolt against that system of oppression. In this, Fanon and Sartre walked parallel roads to freedom.Less

Situating Frantz Fanon’s Account of Black Experience

Robert Bernasconi

Published in print: 2012-06-05

This chapter examines Frantz Fanon’s existential phenomenological analysis of racism as a system. In 1952, Fanon’s Black Skin, White Masks, which became the defining text of what today is called the critical philosophy of race. Black Skin, White Masks is an original work of philosophy in its own right that moves beyond the responses to racism provided by the previous generation of black authors, which included Aimé Césaire and Léopold Sédar Senghor. The chapter explores what moves Fanon’s existentialism from the realm of personal testimony to a philosophy with strong political implications, as well as his engagement with the work of Jean-Paul Sartre. It also traces the evolution of Fanon’s writing on race with his first published work, “The Lived Experience of the Black,” together with his effort to formulate a response to the impasses of his earlier position and to racism more generally. Fanon’s seminal insight was to see racism interweaved with its institutionalized forms in colonialism, which meant that racism could be overcome only through a violent revolt against that system of oppression. In this, Fanon and Sartre walked parallel roads to freedom.

W.E.B. Du Bois’s 1960 essay, “Whither Now and Why,” is a neglected but brilliant sequel to his 1897 essay, “The Conservation of Races,” which inspired much of the pioneering work in philosophy of ...
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W.E.B. Du Bois’s 1960 essay, “Whither Now and Why,” is a neglected but brilliant sequel to his 1897 essay, “The Conservation of Races,” which inspired much of the pioneering work in philosophy of race. In both works DuBois stresses perpetuation of black racial identity and cultural difference; a race should predominantly be understood as a kind of cultural group. Discrimination must end, but cultural identity must remain. In “Whither Now” his position evolves to state the need for education of black children in socialism, but he also states that historical consciousness necessary for social progress mandates that all people, but especially African Americans, recognize Africa and the American Negro’s distinct identity and cultural contributions to world civilization in ancient and modern times. For Dubois postracial thinking was dangerous if it went beyond dismantling an unfair American social hierarchy to blotting out voluntary education in cultural diversity and a pan-African cultural identity.Less

W. E. B. Du Bois’s “Whither Now and Why”

Chike Jeffers

Published in print: 2016-11-24

W.E.B. Du Bois’s 1960 essay, “Whither Now and Why,” is a neglected but brilliant sequel to his 1897 essay, “The Conservation of Races,” which inspired much of the pioneering work in philosophy of race. In both works DuBois stresses perpetuation of black racial identity and cultural difference; a race should predominantly be understood as a kind of cultural group. Discrimination must end, but cultural identity must remain. In “Whither Now” his position evolves to state the need for education of black children in socialism, but he also states that historical consciousness necessary for social progress mandates that all people, but especially African Americans, recognize Africa and the American Negro’s distinct identity and cultural contributions to world civilization in ancient and modern times. For Dubois postracial thinking was dangerous if it went beyond dismantling an unfair American social hierarchy to blotting out voluntary education in cultural diversity and a pan-African cultural identity.

Audre Lorde understood giving isolated conceptual attention to sexual difference to be a tool of social control. I first discuss this claim in the context of Lorde’s philosophy of difference. I argue ...
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Audre Lorde understood giving isolated conceptual attention to sexual difference to be a tool of social control. I first discuss this claim in the context of Lorde’s philosophy of difference. I argue that Beauvoir’s The Ethics of Ambiguity and All Men Are Mortal offer in the figure of ambiguity a philosophy of difference that anticipates important aspects of that of Lorde: in these Beauvoirian texts ambiguity articulates an approach which is simultaneously ecological and political. However, to find this thread in Beauvoir’s oeuvre, it is necessary to read against images that she uses in both books to index ambiguity: Marianne de Sinclair (in All Men are Mortal) and Mademoiselle de Lespinasse (in The Ethics of Ambiguity). These images suggest the conceptual reduction of difference to sexual difference that Lorde warns against. I argue that Beauvoirian ambiguity has a power that can override the two figures that she uses to represent it.Less

Toward a “New and Possible Meeting” : Ambiguity as Difference

Emily Anne Parker

Published in print: 2017-12-28

Audre Lorde understood giving isolated conceptual attention to sexual difference to be a tool of social control. I first discuss this claim in the context of Lorde’s philosophy of difference. I argue that Beauvoir’s The Ethics of Ambiguity and All Men Are Mortal offer in the figure of ambiguity a philosophy of difference that anticipates important aspects of that of Lorde: in these Beauvoirian texts ambiguity articulates an approach which is simultaneously ecological and political. However, to find this thread in Beauvoir’s oeuvre, it is necessary to read against images that she uses in both books to index ambiguity: Marianne de Sinclair (in All Men are Mortal) and Mademoiselle de Lespinasse (in The Ethics of Ambiguity). These images suggest the conceptual reduction of difference to sexual difference that Lorde warns against. I argue that Beauvoirian ambiguity has a power that can override the two figures that she uses to represent it.

This chapter focuses on the conflicting temporal frames deployed by postbellum authors and activists seeking redress. While there was brief national attention given to reparations in the years ...
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This chapter focuses on the conflicting temporal frames deployed by postbellum authors and activists seeking redress. While there was brief national attention given to reparations in the years following the Civil War, the project lost much of its official sanction after the collapse of Reconstruction. By 1896, the majority opinion in Plessy v. Ferguson would argue that servitude did not count in defining race-based discrimination. The Plessy decision thus made it more crucial to clarify what was wrong with slavery and how to account for its effects. Narratives appearing in this moment took up this task: from Samuel Hall’s 47 Years a Slave, to Callie House’s articulations of the aims of the ex-slave pension movement, to Stephen Crane’s The Monster. The chapter argues that Crane’s novella conceives the wrong of slavery in a way that can help resolve the problem of causality confronting philosophical debates about making amends even today.Less

Making Reparation; or, How to Count the Wrongs of Slavery

Gregory Laski

Published in print: 2017-11-30

This chapter focuses on the conflicting temporal frames deployed by postbellum authors and activists seeking redress. While there was brief national attention given to reparations in the years following the Civil War, the project lost much of its official sanction after the collapse of Reconstruction. By 1896, the majority opinion in Plessy v. Ferguson would argue that servitude did not count in defining race-based discrimination. The Plessy decision thus made it more crucial to clarify what was wrong with slavery and how to account for its effects. Narratives appearing in this moment took up this task: from Samuel Hall’s 47 Years a Slave, to Callie House’s articulations of the aims of the ex-slave pension movement, to Stephen Crane’s The Monster. The chapter argues that Crane’s novella conceives the wrong of slavery in a way that can help resolve the problem of causality confronting philosophical debates about making amends even today.